Abandoned Drive-in is scored for a chamber group of four winds and piano and was written especially for Brisbane-based ensemble, the Southern Cross Soloists.
The title refers to an old disused drive-in on the outskirts of Albany, Western Australia – a dishevelled screen stoops sadly before parking bays that are wildly overgrown with weeds and grass. I imagined walking around the drive-in and hearing the ghosts of film soundtracks from a bygone era.
The work is built around ideas from imagined film-noir scores. These musical ‘apparitions’ weave their way in and out of the movement, fleetingly at first, becoming more and more prominent as the movement heads towards its intense conclusion.